Apple Back to School Kindness Challenge to Encourage More Kindness

Inside: Use this Apple Back to School Kindness Challenge to encourage more kindness and give kids lots of chances to practice being kind.

As we head into back to school season, teachers are setting up classrooms, creating lesson plans, and unjamming the copier.

But they’re also spending time getting their class lists and crossing their fingers, it’s a good group of kids.

The good news is, that while some classes gel together better than others, educators have the power to create the classroom culture they want.

We can set kids up to want to be kind, want to be helpful, to cheer each other on and cheer each other up.

We can create a group of students we enjoy being around, simply by setting our kids up to know that we value kindness, we encourage kindness, and we “reward” kindness with praise, with winks, and maybe even with trips to the treasure box.

Positive reinforcement is one of many tools teachers use to incentivize students to showcase behaviors they want more of…kindness included. And while we want kids to be kind without the reward, in the beginning of the school year or for kids who really struggle with kindness, positive reinforcement is an essential tool to create new habits.

One simple way to do this easily is to use one of our many kindness challenges…and this apple back to school kindness challenge is perfect for August and September to get your kids super clear on your expectations and to give kind acts and words a little boost. You can wean them off the “rewards” later.

More Back to School Kindness and Social Emotional Learning Activities:

Kindness can of course be taught without cutesy themes, but using seasons, holidays and things kids already enjoy- like back to school- can increase the buy-in and pique their interest. It’ll make learning a little more fun and a ton more hands-on.

We like to learn about apples with this Apples Unit Study for all ages and we play this Apple Kind or Unkind Sort,

We connect kindness with writing with this Apple Kindness Craft and Write Activity.

We use these Acts of Kindness Links to show how many acts of kindness a class or school can really do!

We read about all the ways to be kind at school with this I am Kind at School Emergent Reader and this I am Kind at School Early Reader (for more advanced readers).

We use these Back to School Kindness Role Playing cards to practice all the ways to be kind at school and on the playground.

We make these Kindness Pencils for classmates.

We hang up these Kindness posters as reminders of all the ways we can be kind on the playground and in the classroom.

And we use this Apple Back to School Kindness Challenge.

Why Should We Use Kindness Challenges?

We shouldn’t need to praise kids to be kind, they should just want to be kind and then do it.

Well, yes, in an ideal world.

But when we’re intentionally teaching kids to be kind, we have to bring out the big guns and use all the tools at our disposal, including positive reinforcement.

When kindness becomes their norm, their habit, and their gut reaction, then yes, we can wean them off the “rewards” and positive reinforcement.

Kindness is a verb. It’s something you have to do, rather than something you just talk about.

So if we are serious about focusing on social-emotional learning and kindness, we have to teach kids how to be kind with role playing strategies and with social emotional learning curriculum and then give them ample opportunities to be kind.

We have to give them situations where they can practice being kind to classmates, siblings, teammates, friends, adults, and people in the service industry (food servers, mail carriers, trash collectors, custodians, retail staff, flight attendants, etc.)

So to make kindness consistent and more of an everyday activity, we can gameify kindness and make it a challenge (because we know most kids can’t resist trying to “win.”)

We have Monthly Kindness Challenges like this one.

We have a Simple Normal Everyday Scavenger Hunt that kids love.

We have seasonal Kindness Challenges so kids do one kind act a week: Summer Kind Kids Challenge, Fall Kind Kids Challenge, Winter Kind Kids Challenge, Spring Kind Kids Challenge.

We have 100 Acts of Kindness Challenge so kids do one kind act a day and by the time they get to the 100th day of school, they’re 100 days smarter AND 100 days kinder.

But to connect kindness to fun things kids already love, we also have monthly kindness challenges like our Apple Back to School Kindness Challenge.

How to use the Apples Back to School Kindness Challenge

1. Download and print the version you wish to use: black and white to color in the apples or color version and cross off the apples. (download it below.)

2. Every time one child is kind to another child, they get to color in an apple or cross off an apple. If you’re using it for students, every time they are kind to another student they can color in or cross off an apple.

3. When they get to the end of the sheet, they can earn an apple treat (like caramel apples), hot apple cider, or a special activity.

4. Continue with the positive reinforcement with another kindness challenge so kindness becomes a habit, like our Halloween Kindness Challenge or Thanksgiving Kindness Challenge.

OR… get our Year of Kindness Challenges here all in one place.

Kindness Ideas to Help Kids Easily Act and Speak with Kindness

Sometimes it can be hard for kids to come up with ideas on how to show kindness to others. But it doesn’t have to be hard when you know there are two different kinds of kindness:

big, loud, showy acts of kindness, often random acts of kindness
simple, normal, everyday acts of kindness that can become habit if we practice them enough

Random Acts of Kindness are fun and great, especially for Random Acts of Kindness Day in February. But the much more impactful acts of kindness take no planning, no props, and no money.